Above Image: Last week, the ACUA, an agency of Atlantic County government, sponsored an “Electric Vehicle Celebration” which promoted all the climate lies of Biden Democrats. It falsely claimed that electric cars and trucks fight “climate change”, give us “clean air” and save money. None of this is true. Electric cars and trucks are inefficient, depend on electricity produced by fossil fuels miles away and stored in expensive, heavy, wasteful batteries. Electric car batteries require rare, toxic minerals mined with child labor in Africa under appalling conditions. Most are produced by Communist Chinese companies. Charging electric vehicles will put more stress on grids that are already often underpowered because of destruction of reliable oil, gas, and nuclear power plants and dependence on unreliable wind and solar. Electric vehicles will make it easier for oppressive regimes to monitor and control travel. Biden Democrats support all this. But Atlantic County government is run by Dennis Levinson, its Republican county executive. Seven of its nine county commissioners (freeholders) are Republicans. The Atlantic County Utilities Authority (ACUA) is their county agency. Why are they allowing this?
Atlantic County created the ACUA in 1975 to build and run the first county-wide sewerage system. It built 60 miles of pipes and collects sewage from 14 towns in Atlantic County. It also built a treatment plant in Atlantic City to remove “85% to 95% of the pollutants”. It also built an “outfall pipe” to pump the treated sewage 8,000 feet into the ocean off of Raleigh Avenue in Atlantic City.
The ACUA today spends about $28 million each year to operate that system. That comes to roughly 38% of its yearly budget. We pay for those operations through our sewer utility bills.
However, the ACUA spends most of its money, roughly $46 million for things it was never intended or designed to do. They include trash and garbage collection, recycling, and “community and education” campaigns to promote the Democrat “climate change” political agenda.
The ACUA collects and disposes of household trash from 17 of the 23 towns in Atlantic County, and three towns in Cumberland County. It uses its tax-free status and government to eliminate competition from local governments and private businesses.
The ACUA also separately collects and disposes of paper, cans, bottles and paper from 20 towns in Atlantic County, three towns in Cumberland County and one town in Cape May County. It calls this “recycling”. However, most of the the “recycling” it collects separately is burned or dumped as trash and garbage.
Taxpayers in these towns pay the ACUA through their real estate taxes. However, they have no say as to how the ACUA is run or how much they pay.
The ACUA pays its top 11 employees a total of $1.905,528, or an average of $173,229 each.
In 2021, a private trash company owned by James DiNatale bought a railroad siding in Pleasantville. It was about to compete with the ACUA by using railroad cars to transport debris from local construction projects to legal dumps. This would have used less fossil fuel and cut costs for local construction companies. For more than a year, the ACUA used its public employees and taxpayer money to run a dishonest “Stop the Dump” campaign to stop the project and keep its monopoly.
Why does the ACUA collect and dispose of cans, bottles, paper and plastic separately from other trash and garbage? How much carbon fuel is needlessly burned to do this? How much money is wasted? Why is this done?
The ACUA prints and distributes thousands of copies of its private newspaper throughout Atlantic County. It is called Atlantic County Recycles. However, it does not answer any of those questions.
For twenty years, the Communist regime in China promoted recycling in America. Its giant container cargo ships were filled with goods it sold to America. Those ships returned to China mostly empty, because the Communists would not let American companies compete there. Until 2018, the Chinese regime allowed those ships to bring massive amounts of American “recycling” to China, where it was dumped or burned. However, China stopped accepting that waste in 2018.
Today, most “recycled” waste from America is shipped to poor countries overseas where it is dumped or burned. Those countries include Mexico, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Turkey, Pakistan, and El Salvador. Much plastic waste is also shipped to Canada and Germany. However, those countries re-ship most of it to other poor countries in Africa and Asia where it is dumped or burned. Much of that plastic is washed into rivers where it ends up in the ocean. Most environmental experts have recognized that recycling of plastic bottles and containers is a fraud, a waste, and a failure. Only about 8% of plastic waste is recycled into other products. Many of those recycled plastic products are toxic and defective.
Click Here For Link To: Greenpeace report finds most plastic goes to landfills as production ramps up : NPR
Click Here For Link To: Recycling isn’t working – here are 15 ways to shrink your plastic footprint | Plastics | The Guardian
Click Here For Link To: Where your recycling actually goes—and what you can do about it this Earth Day (phys.org)
Most experts claim it is much cheaper and safer for the environment to simply dump plastic waste in regular dumps here in the United States! If the ACUA were honest, it would openly admit that its recycling program is an expensive fraud and failure.
Finally, the ACUA spends much of its money on “Community & Education” projects. promoting the fake “green” or “climate change” agenda that is ruining our economy and promoting the massive wind turbine projects off our beaches. Besides promoting “recycling” and electric vehicles, the ACUA systematically uses Democrat Party lies to promote wind turbines. Many of those lies are in this “Fact Sheet” posted by the ACUA.
Above Image: “Fact Sheet” published by ACUA showcases two of its biggest lies. It falsely claims “70,359 Metric Tons of CO2 Prevented Since 2005”. This is a blatant lie. It falsely assumes that all electricity from its wind turbines was produced when it was needed and used by Atlantic Electric. It falsely assumes that no fossil fuel was burned as backup to be ready for when the wind slowed down or stopped. If wind actually produced electricity when it was needed, more wind turbines would make electricity less expensive. However, wind energy causes massive hikes in electric bills because much wind energy is “dumped” because it is produced when not needed. Also, much fossil fuel must be burned as backup to be ready for when wind speeds drop. The ACUA claim that its 5 wind turbines “saved $6.9 million” is equally false. First, the 5 wind turbines had a cost of $12.5 million to begin with. Second, those wind turbines required expensive repairs and maintenance during the past 17 years. Third most, if not all of the money “saved” by the ACUA did NOT come from the value of electricity produced by the wind turbines. The money “saved” by the ACUA came from various federal and state taxes, and hidden fees added to utility bills in New Jersey.
In 2006, a private company built 5 wind turbines on land owned by the Atlantic County Utilities Authority (ACUA). Each one cost $2.5 million for a total of $12.5 million. They are now owned by two private companies that pay money to the ACUA. However, we are not aware of any reports showing how much power produced these wind turbines is “dumped” and wasted. We have no idea of how much fossil fuels are burned to run back-up generators that are not needed, but which must be ready to supply electricity instantly when the wind stops. We have no idea how much of the money paid to the ACUA comes from useful energy produced. We have no idea how much of the money paid the the ACUA comes from extra fees added to our electric bills.
Notice how the above “Fact Sheet” by the ACUA leaves out these key facts:
The five wind turbines may produce “millions of kilowatt hours per year.” However, much if not most of that is wasted. Even more money and fossil fuels are wasted on back-up generators that are only needed for unpredictable and unreliable “green” energy.
The electric grid, like everything plugged into it, needs steady, reliable electric current. Your microwave needs 1,200 watts at 10 amps and 120 volts every time you use it.
The private owners of the five wind turbines at the ACUA in Atlantic City report only how much money they pay the Atlantic County Utility Authorities for putting wind turbines on its land. They do not report how much of their power is dumped. Or how much money and fossil fuels the electric company must waste to back them up.
The professors and students at Stockton University’s $39.5-million Unified Science Center could easily do that research. Shouldn’t they do it before we build 198 Orsted wind turbines 15 miles out in the ocean at more than $10 million each?
Click Here For Link To Previous Post: It’s Not Too Late To Stop Ocean Wind Disaster – Liberty and Prosperity
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